The good news is that there’s more good news than bad news, more kind people than mean. With a tiny shift in focus, you’ll make this your reality. [read more at HowDoesShe.com]
Aspirations
Drops of Awesome LDS Resources
Wondering how Drops of Awesome is informed by my faith? You’ve come to the right place!
I recognize that most of my readers are not members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and many do not share my belief in God. This is why I created the Drops of Awesome Journal with a broad focus to reach a wider audience. The book really zones in on what each of us can do personally to shift our focus and recognize the good we are doing in the world.
However, I also find great joy in my belief that I am not doing this alone, that there is someone far greater than myself contributing to my Bucket of Awesome.
So, after several requests for LDS resources to accompany lessons and activities about Drops of Awesome, I’ve been slowly gathering scriptures and conference talks that will work as a supplement to the book, coming out in September from Familius. I will continue to update this page as I find material. Feel free to leave me a comment with a talk or scripture reference that helps you remember to keep trying and that our small efforts matter….
I Could Have Danced All Night
It’s jazz night at the Senior Center. Dan’s playing saxophone in the band and the kids and I are eating delicious gentle-on-the-dentures delicacies, reading middle grade fantasy novels, and periodically dancing like spasmodic maniacs.
My feet move in a pattern somewhere between awkward tween shuffle and the jive. My arms twirl and throw Laylee around until she’s dizzy, grinning and confused. We’ve got moves. They just might not be sanctioned by any of the currently ruling international dance organizations.
Out on the floor is a couple who knows all the moves. They’re probably in their eighties or nineties. She’s beautiful and he’s a little hunched over but incredibly strong and confident. They glide through turns and lifts like they’re still in their twenties and people applaud them whenever they take the floor.
Near the end of the night, the man taps me on the shoulder and asks me to dance.
“I don’t really know how,” I laugh.
His smile is warm as he gestures to the floor. “It sure looks like you do.”
“You are kind, but last time I danced with someone at one of these things, he was very disappointed.”
“I can’t believe he would tell you that. I have never in my life made a lady feel bad about her dancing.” He looks incensed.
“I’ll try if you promise to help me and be patient.”
His look says, Don’t be ridiculous.
It’s an understatement to say he’s good. He is A-FLIPPIN-MAZING! Hands down the best dancer I’ve ever danced with, of any age. I shuffle along at first but gradually start to pick up on his lead and find myself doing moves I’ve never attempted. My face is locked in a perma-grin.
Between songs, I thank him for dancing with me. “My husband is in the band so I rarely get to dance.”
“And let me guess,” he says with a twinkle in his eye, “If you’re husband’s in the band, he’s probably not much of a dancer anyway.” He winks. This ninety-year-old man is flirting with me.
I don’t let him lift me off the ground, although I can tell he wants to, and when the song ends my dip is not as low as he intends. At 35, I’m not as graceful or petite as his bride. But I feel amazing.
As he leads me off the floor, everyone applauds, and I realize that I didn’t once notice anyone around us while we were dancing. I’ve rarely been so absorbed in an activity. My cheeks ache from smiling and I’m drenched in sweat.
That dance was a gift.
I take a minute to imagine myself as a young girl in the 1940s, having a night out at a dance hall. Instead of Chacos and a t-shirt, I’m wearing pumps, hose, and my best dress, my hair curled in victory rolls. I wonder what my dance partner looked like back then.
Then, I laugh to think what senior centers will look like when I’m in my nineties. Will we be crowded around an aging DJ, cranking out Milli Vanilli and Dub Step remixes, while we imitate MC Hammer and pop and lock? Maybe one of my friends will teach krumping on Tuesday afternoons.
But no. We will never grow old so I don’t even need to think about it. I could better use my energy preparing for the hip hop class I’m taking with my friends later this summer…
To-Do or To-Done?
“To-Do or not To-Do, that is the question. I have a wide pendulum swing when it comes to To-Do lists. There are times when I am obsessively writing, writing, writing everything I will do on a given day and checking off the items as I go. At these times, I will often add times to each item so my day is a series of overscheduled minutiae. At other times, a 43-day-old To-Do list languishes on a napkin in my purse or a neglected app on my phone and I’m flying by the seat of my capri pants, doing everything or nothing as the mood strikes me and forever missing deadlines in a house that looks like the seven dwarves’ cottage before Snow White kicked their butts into gear.”
[Read about my current answer to this problem at HowDoesShe.com]
Who Do You Think You Are?
I’m serving up a little introspection over at HowDoesShe.com today, courtesy of Magoo and a belching contest. You’re welcome.
“Who are you, deep down in your cream-filled center? If you had a five minute interaction with a complete stranger, would she come away knowing the you that you want to make known? In those five minutes, would your words and actions be in line with your core beliefs and ambitions?” [Read more at HowDoesShe.com]
Blowing Young Minds at a Bookstore Near You
When I say Laylee loves the Fablehaven series by Brandon Mull, I mean LOVE, as in the characters are practically honorary family members. I’m fairly certain that she’s read all five books in the series no fewer than twenty times. You might think, Fablehaven must be the only thing she reads, but you’d be mistaken. The girl averages eight or more novels each week. Fablehaven books just seem to make their way back to the top of the pile more frequently than most.
The love of reading has spread to Magoo and he’s currently reading Brandon Mull’s most recent fiction, Sky Raiders. When my kids read, they read everywhere. I recently took this picture of Magoo, reading Sky Raiders, walking through Costco and holding onto the side of the cart like it was a Seeing Eye dog.
I thought, If someone is ever that engrossed in one of my novels, I will want to know about it. So, I took a picture of Magoo to tweet to the author. When I went to find his Twitter handle, I noticed he was currently in Seattle. I tweeted to ask him if he had any public events. He responded quickly that he and a few other authors were in town doing a series tour for Scholastic and he had a book signing in a little over an hour in downtown Seattle.
Now, we always say we live “in Seattle,” but we really live way the heck outside of Seattle and we had other stuff going on Tuesday night, but I rallied the kids, threw them in the van and we headed to the U district to meet their favorite author.
At the University Bookstore, they were treated to readers’ theatre with Brandon Mull, James Dashner, Gordon Korman, and Jude Watson. I think Laylee almost had an excitement-induced seizure.
Then we made our way upstairs, where Laylee and Magoo gave Brandon carpel tunnel, having him sign his name on a gazillion books and the leather covers of their nooks, where most of his books live at our house.
Laylee is rarely at a loss for words, but when she met Brandon, she couldn’t remember the answers to basic questions, like how old she was.
“Did I blow your mind with that question?” he asked.
She giggled.
I had to translate.
“Have you read some of my books?”
“I’veReadEverySingleBookYou’veEverWrittenExceptTheSecondCandyShopWars BecauseIOnlyRecentlyFoundOutItExisted.” She managed to breathe out.
He was sweet and took real time with each of the fans standing in line. A really great guy. When we left the bookstore and headed home, Laylee told me it was one of the best nights of her life. Sometimes it’s worth blowing off other commitments in order to be spontaneous and blow your kids’ minds. Laylee’s biggest, hairiest career goal is to be a fantasy author and meeting Brandon Mull was just the boost she needed to keep going with her writing. I am grateful for people who are capable of being successful and humble at the same time, who are willing to inspire kids in a genuine way.
Well done, Mr. Mull.
How Can I Be Happy About This?
“Three minutes.
That’s how long I had to work hard to focus on the positive before I began to feel happy. Three minutes of work to turn a nightmare into a great memory.”
Half-Hearted
“Try your best. Invest yourself in everything you do. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it. But do you wanna know a secret? Some of my greatest successes in life have started with half-hearted attempts. True story.” [read more at HowDoesShe.com]
Managing Great Expectations
If there’s something good about to happen to my family, chances are solid, like, around 95%, that my kids know nothing about it. They’re going along in their daily lives and BAM! Disneyland or KAPOW! Ice cream sundaes. I try to always catch them off guard. Always. Why all the secrecy?
Do I love surprises?
Yes.
Do I also not want to see the looks on my kids’ faces if I tell them something seriously rad is gonna go down and then, after weeks of anticipation, Disneyland runs out of batteries or all the ice cream goes on strike?
Yes.
So I keep their expectations low and then shock them with awesomeness. But, I’ve run into a problem with this line of thinking. I’ve noticed recently that I’ve started to set low expectations for life, for the world, for the people I love.
Too often I find myself assuming the worst, stressing out because I’m sure something bad is going to happen and then feeling mild relief when the ceiling doesn’t cave in.
This is a sucky way to live.
So, I’ve decided to start managing my expectations a different way. I want to see what will happen if I expect everything to be amazing.
I gave this a try recently and it was one of the best days I’ve had in a long time.
It was a crazy day. The kids left for school at 8am and we ran from school to activity to activity, not getting them back home until after what sane people would consider bedtime.
Our bathroom fan had been broken for a few weeks and “It’s past time to fix it,” said the mildew. I bought a fan over a week earlier, looked up instructions on YouTube, investigated the attic, and then gave up, sure the job would be a nightmare. I have a huge fear of attics. They have rats. And itchy insulation. And spiders. And dark mysterious corners. And the possibility of crashing through the sheetrock if you take one wrong step.
But if I was in a new training mode to expect everything to go well, to expect great things, then why not go for it?
I decided that I would install the fan triumphantly and it would be my greatest YouTube School of HandyWomanry coup. I gathered all the necessary tools, got Wanda set up playing in the room below the opening, hauled some huge boards up the ladder to give me a more stable work surface, and flipped the circuit breakers.
And then I dropped the ceiling panel on the ground and broke off a big chunk. I persisted. I expected to be successful. And then I found that the people who installed the original fans were idiots and that the joists in my attic were too small and the fan hole was in the wrong place and the wiring was crazy and there was no humanly possible way for me to do the repair.
So I left all the tools in the attic, vacuumed the chunks of drywall and insulation from the floor, washed the cobwebs and insulation from my hair and body and closed up shop for the day. But, we were one hour and a ton of information closer to fixing the problem, and I didn’t stress about it, and I was so proud of myself for trying, only possible because I expected the best and went through with a plan.
Then I needed to kill an hour while Laylee was at ballet so I took the kids to Costco, as usual, but I decided beforehand that we were going to have the most fun ever. And guess what? We did.
That night we planned to attend a church meeting that I wasn’t jazzed about, so I decided to get jazzed about it, to assume it would be fun and informational and a great experience for me and the kids. And guess what? It was pretty awesome.
Previously, I had no real interest in the subject matter, but they made it come alive in an engaging way. Old men singing campfire songs and people launching rockets and riding a zipline in the conference center where the Mormon Tabernacle Choir sings. Need I say more?
I would rather spend my entire life expecting to be delighted, only to be disappointed every once in a while, than live in a constant state of impending doom, only to be periodically surprised by goodness.
My goodness to doom ratio needs to grow much higher than it currently is. I think it takes practice, but it’s a fun skill to spend time cultivating.
Magoo says, “Mom?”
I think, “I wonder what amazing thing he’s going to tell me. Let me prepare to soak up his cuteness,” instead of my usual, “What’s wrong NOW?!”
Dan says, “I have something to tell you when I get home.”
I think, “Oooo. I love surprises,” instead of, “Did he lose his job, or did he get laid off? Where will live? How long will the Macaroni supplies hold?”
What do you expect from your life?
I spend about 95% of my life anticipating what will happen, expecting things to happen, and maybe 3% having things actually happen. 2% of my life is spent sleeping. So, if I am expecting sadness and doom, then I will be spending about 95% of my life living in a place of fear and anxiety and 3% or less experiencing joy. I say 3% or less because maybe a fraction of one percent of the things that happen in my life are actually doom-filled things. Most of my experiences are really good.
But, if I decide to expect joy, friendship, love, and fun, then I’ll spend the majority of my life dwelling in that place. And, oops, every once in a while unexpected doom will descend and I’ll deal with it.
Zombie Apocalypse on the horizon? Surprise me. I’ll store munitions and jello just in case, but I’ll assume I’ll never have to use them and, in the meantime, I’ll be looking for fluffy bunnies and marshmallow peeps to come moaning down the street. They’re much more fun to contemplate.
I Know! You Can Borrow My Car
My parents taught me to be kind, loving, honest, selfless and… auto maintenance. That’s why this particular story is so embarrassing to me.
For the Thanksgiving/Christmas season, my mom and dad are in town, about 45 minutes away from here. My dad is working as the main attraction and my mom is here to be with her lover and working in a supporting role on set.
For my mom, it’s hourly part time holiday work. For my dad, it’s a job share with another man who looks a lot like him. I think of them as high-end models. My dad works mornings and the other man works evenings. My mom flew out here with the intention of working the same hours as my dad.
But another one of my dad’s jolly doppelgangers, working an hour and a half north of here, got sick. So my dad’s job share partner took over all the hours at my dad’s mall and my dad is currently spending his days up near the Canadian border bringing joy to children and their confused parents. “Why is Christmas so early this year?”
That leaves my mom living in a hotel with no vehicle during the day and a day job to which she no longer has a ride.
Perfect solution. She could borrow one of our cars. Dan takes the bus to work every day and it just sits there. Soccer season is over. It was all perfect. So, on Sunday night, after much persuasion, I convinced her to take Dan’s car, my first car, a car that has over 100,000 miles on it but has served us well.
As she was about to leave, Dan said, “You should check the oil. It might be low.”
Apparently “low” means there is approximately zero oil in the engine and the smear that remains at the bottom is black as tar or midnight or super old oil. So, I got in my van and followed her to the gas station to put some oil in the car, oil she insisted on paying for.
On the way there, I noticed that the left brake light was burnt out. Awesome.
“Mom. It also looks like the left brake light is burnt out, although I don’t know how a person is supposed to know that kind of thing unless she is driving behind herself or gets pulled over.” I start talking really fast at this point. “I hope you don’t get pulled over, but I think it’s still safe to drive and do you think that you could go replace the bulb tomorrow and maybe get the oil changed? I’ll pay you back and I’m really sorry.”
She was super gracious about it. “You’re lending me your car. It’s the least I can do. Blah blah. Nice mom stuff. Blah blah.” And all I could think was, My dad is gonna know of this and he will not outwardly judge me, but a little part inside of him will sigh and he will think, “Nothing’s changed since high school when she would run my car into cement posts and forget to put gas in the tank because apparently cars can run on school spirit and teenage infatuation.”
Then we went to put the oil in, two quarts to get it reasonably full, and I noticed that the power steering fluid was low.
“So, ahem, tomorrow after work when you get the oil changed and the brake light fixed, can you also please make sure they check the power steering fluid? I think it will be fine for the rest of your drive tonight in the dark on unfamiliar highways. Hope you don’t get a ticket for this! KayThanksBye.”
AAAHHHHH! A kind gesture is so much more kind if it doesn’t come with a massive to-do list that says, “Remember when you taught me how to be responsible and care for my belongings? Oops. I accidentally… the whole car.”